Simi Valley transplant recipient meets donor for first time

Photo by Bob Riha Jr./City of Hope
Donor Barry Crackett (left), of Northumberland, England, addresses the crowd after meeting recipient Ryan Compton as Ryan’s father, Jason, holds him and mother Maggie (in glasses) looks on Friday at City of Hope in Duarte.

Bob Riha Jr.

Three years ago, Simi Valley resident Ryan Compton, then 5 years old, was battling leukemia and received a bone-marrow transplant that saved his life.

His donor, an English designer engineer, was anonymous to him.

Anonymous until Friday morning, when Ryan and his donor, 34-year-old Barry Crackett from Northumberland, England, met for the first time at the City of Hope in Duarte.

It was an emotional meeting for the two and their families at the hospital where Ryan was treated.

The City of Hope hosted its 37th annual bone marrow transplant reunion, at which more than 1,000 cancer survivors and their families returned to the hospital to celebrate lives made possible through transplant.

It was one of the largest such reunion events in the nation, and it was marked by two survivors, including Ryan, meeting their donors for the first time.

Before Ryan and Crackett met, they were separated by a partition as they eagerly waited with their families, as well as doctors and nurses from the City of Hope.

They smiled as they walked toward each other. After shaking Ryan’s hand, Crackett picked up the boy and embraced him.

Ryan’s mother, Maggie Compton, wiped her tears as she watched the reunion.

“Today is a day our family will never forget. It’s the day we get to thank in person the man that saved my son’s life,” she said.

She recalled the emotional journey that led them to that day.

In March 2007, at just 22 months old, Ryan turned lethargic and started spiking high fevers. The doctors thought it was the flu, but he was eventually diagnosed with acute lymphoblastic leukemia and underwent intensive chemotherapy over the next 3 1/2 years.

Ryan eventually relapsed, requiring him to receive extremely aggressive chemotherapy and four days of radiation so intense, it maxed out his lifetime limit.

“It made the first 3 1/2 years seem easy. He was at the end of the line,” Maggie Compton said.

His only hope was a bone-marrow transplant, but given his very mixed ancestry, the doctors feared that finding Ryan’s genetic twin would be unlikely.

Maggie Compton said they were stunned when a perfect match was identified and willing to donate. However, residual leukemia cells were found and transplant plans were briefly halted.

“We decided together as a team to take a chance and go forward with the transplant, even though he was at high risk for transplant failure,” said Dr. Anna Pawlowska, director of City of Hope’s Pediatric Bone Marrow Transplant Program.

The transplant has been successful so far. In February 2012, Ryan went off all his medications. However, years of treatment took a toll, with the boy having multiple learning disabilities.

While Ryan was recovering at his home in Simi Valley, Crackett was sitting alongside the hospital bed of his wife, Jessica, in England admiring their newborn son when he opened a card with a little boy’s handprint and the words, “Thank you for saving my life!”

Back in 2002, Crackett was moved to sign up for the registry after seeing a television appeal about a little girl needing a marrow transplant. Nine years later, the national registry, known as the Anthony Nolan Trust, called him.

“There was no question about whether I would go through with the donation after finding out there was someone whose life depended on me,” Crackett said.

He later learned that the patient that received his bone marrow was a child. The donor program requires donors and recipients to wait two years before they can meet.

“It was exciting, daunting, all that sort of stuff, then you start thinking about this little recipient. Becoming a donor was an easy decision to make, but a harder decision was whether to find out updates of how the transplant went. I am so pleased I did,” Crackett said.

Seeing Ryan for the first time Friday and hearing about his progress reaffirmed his decision to donate. Crackett introduced his son, Sol, to Ryan at the event.

“I just hope that if my baby ever needed a donation, there would be someone to step up,” Crackett said.

In attendance Friday were police and firefighters, credited by the family members for sustaining them financially and emotionally.

Ryan’s father, Jason Compton, a Los Angeles Police Department officer, thanked Crackett and the staff at the City of Hope for saving his son’s life.

Everyone at the City of Hope “became family. And now we have three more,” he said, referring to the Crackett family.